In the Claws of the Eagle (23 page)

‘Erich,’ she said one day after one of her disturbing dreams. ‘I’m worried about Izaac. I hear him playing in my dreams. But I see all sorts of nightmare things as well.’

‘We all have nightmares. If he’s playing his violin I think you can take it he’s all right. We’ve got to believe Klaus on this; he should know, he’s out there. The camps are just temporary 
accommodation for the Jews until the war is over. He even said the place where Izaac is, is like a holiday camp. They say the first class carriages are all being used to take the Jews east.’

Louise was still uneasy, although, when she thought about it, the images Izaac had been showing her recently were mostly of good-natured activity.

Christmas 1943 brought a strange proposal from the Germans to the Jewish Administration.

‘No! No! No! I will not cooperate! This is Hanukah, the time when we, as Jews, celebrate
independence
against tyranny!’ Rabbi Ishmael brought a bony fist down on the table.

‘But if we cooperate, conditions will improve, Ishmael!’ the leader of the Council of Elders appealed. ‘The Commandant calls it his Christmas present to us.’

‘Fiddlesticks! Beware of Greeks bearing gifts. We stood up to the Greeks two thousand years ago …’ Izaac wondered what this had to do with the Germans, but he could see a religious lecture a mile off. With a deferential bow he cut across the
quavering
voice, ‘Excuse me, Rabbi, but can someone explain exactly what it is the Germans want us to do?’ He got a grateful glance from the Elder.

‘The Danish government, Izaac, are worried about their Jews, the ones that have been arriving here recently from
Denmark
. They want the International Red Cross to visit Terezín to certify that conditions here are adequate.’

‘But they aren’t adequate!’ said Izaac in indignation.

‘That’s the point, if we agree to cooperate, the Germans have promised to reduce over-crowding, improve our food rations and support our free-time activities. Our role will be to clean the place up; they will provide paint and materials. It will
be a chance for us to show that we are capable of policing and governing ourselves! Hopefully the Red Cross will see this, and insist on the same standards in the other camps.’

‘Pah! Another Potemkin village!’ snapped old Rabbi Ishmael. Nobody paid any attention to him; the idea of improved
conditions
was tempting them all. Izaac was trying to remember what a Potemkin village was. It was coming back to him … General Potemkin, a favourite of Empress Catherine II of Russia, worried that the Empress would see the dreadful
poverty
of her rule, had special villages built before the Empress’s visits, and filled them with ‘happy peasants’ singing and
dancing
. Old Ishmael had a point, but the Red Cross would never be fooled, they would see through the ruse. Anyway the
concessions
would be worth it.

‘Hey there, Pafko!’ Izaac shouted. Pafko had a clipboard in his hands and was looking up studiously at the windows of the Magdeburg building as if surveying the paintwork. The boy took a pencil from behind his ear, appeared to jot something on to his clipboard, and walked on. Izaac lengthened his stride and caught up with him. ‘Pafko, where’s your brick and bucket? Have you been caught for a job at last?’

Pafko gave a broad grin. ‘I’ve promoted myself. Look!’ he held up his clipboard. ‘It’s a lot lighter than the bucket and brick, and it works just as well. I bet you thought I was doing something official. See, it’s even got a swastika on the back,’ he held it up.

‘You shirker! So I’ve been on my hands and knees digging up the grass from between the cobbles while you wander about pretending to be the town surveyor.’ Under the
Embellishment
everyone had to work, even those exempted for other reasons, it was an all-out effort. 

‘Surveyors can go anywhere,’ Pafko said with a wink. ‘If it moves, move it; if you can’t move it, paint it; if it moves on its own salute it. The Germans just love clipboards!’ he grinned. Izaac changed the subject.

‘How many performances of Brundibár have you done so far?’

‘Over forty. You know they are putting up a special stage for the Red Cross visit? Have you noticed, the food is getting better?’ Pafko prattled on. Izaac wondered what would happen if his voice broke; he must be nearly fourteen. They all agreed that if he couldn’t sing, they would have to cancel. It wasn’t just that people loved him and his moustache; he had made the villain, Brundibár, human, and human villains can be defeated. Izaac thought of the Terezín March they all liked to sing:

There was a feeling of optimism throughout the camp. Transports continued to leave, but as long as your name wasn’t on the list you didn’t have to worry. If they hadn’t been so busy with what the Germans called ‘The Embellishment’, they might have noticed that it was the old, the sick, and even the ugly that were being magicked away. They left in the early
mornings
; old couples united briefly for yet another train journey to God knows where. The Germans were everywhere, planning the exact route that the Red Cross delegation would follow. 

Sub-standard buildings were locked up. Mock washing
facilities
were put in. Fresh paint hid squalor. Teams of gardeners worked in the wide moat to bring on a lush crop of vegetables. A café was opened. There was nothing in it, but it was fun to sit there and pretend. A group of girls with rakes and spades practised the song they would sing as they passed the
delegation
on their way to work. Women were rehearsed to sit in the barracks knitting and talking among themselves about menus. In the café a little boy was to complain: ‘Not sardines again!’ He didn’t know what a sardine was. A football team began cautious training on increased rations; they mustn’t fall over from hunger on the pitch. Orchestras, bands, choirs, and plays went into rehearsals. Like everyone else, Izaac was far too busy to wonder why on earth they were all doing their utmost to help the Germans deceive the Red Cross.

In the midst of this came a rumour that the British and Americans had landed somewhere in France; Normandy, the rumours said. Suddenly there was light at the end of the tunnel. Then, for the few days before the delegation arrived from Switzerland, the quality of food improved dramatically. The Germans didn’t want people who were used to starvation rations throwing up in front of the delegation because the food was too rich. Everything was ready.

Marti Bochsler looked down on the coloured strips of land – golden corn, green grass, blue green kale – as the plane of the Red Cross Delegation circled Prague airport. His hands were sweating, he didn’t like flying, and even though there were massive red crosses on the wings and fuselage, flying over war-torn Europe was always risky. He was a junior clerk with the delegation and had never been on an international
inspection
before. Like everyone else on the delegation he had heard 
terrible rumours about the conditions in the concentration camps. What if they found that these were correct? Would he be able to take it? He had heard of delegates coming home nervous wrecks from examining prisoner of war camps, and this was the first concentration camp the Red Cross had been allowed to see.

The plane bounced, bounced again, and trundled along the runway to where a group of staff cars were waiting. Marti stared through the small window at the SS men in their black uniforms. These Teutonic giants would never lose the war! He thought with momentary pity of the Americans and British fighting their way through Normandy.

The drive to Terezín took about an hour. Marti enjoyed the fresh air in the open car, even though the dust of the cavalcade fell thickest on the last car where he sat behind Dr Elser, a junior doctor, and between two stony SS privates. He felt like a prisoner himself. ‘Remember, delegates,’ their Chef de Mission had said in Geneva, ‘we are here to record what we see, we want facts, not rumours. You are forbidden to talk to the ghetto inmates. Our role is to see that the living
accommodation
in the camp is adequate, that they have proper sanitation, and a sufficient diet. Forget the rumours, collect the facts.’ Marti felt for his notebook in his pocket and checked his
pencils
in his top pocket.

In the end he enjoyed the day. The camp was clean, the food was good. Dr Elser estimated the calories of the meals they saw being put down for the inmates, all of which Marti entered in his notebook. The bunks and the spaces about them were within international standards. There seemed to be a musician in every room. They happened on a jazz band,
playing
to a small audience, and a quartet was playing to old people sitting in the café. Dr Elser tasted the bread in the dining room and declared it excellent. They were even invited 
to watch a football match, and the barracks overlooking the pitch were crowded with children who made a healthy lot of noise. The highlight of his day was a performance by the children of an opera composed by one of the inmates. He noticed that even the Camp Commandant was amused by the
Hitler-like
antics of the wicked organ grinder.

It was only when Izaac turned, aglow with pride for his young performers, and found himself face to face with the beaming faces of the Red Cross delegation and their flanking SS minders that he realised how their cooperation with the ‘
Embellishment
’ had backfired. Those fat faces showed no penetration, no conception that everything they were seeing was a
paper-thin
facade; that it was sham! The cockroaches would flood the kitchens after dark. The dead cart would resume its rounds, carrying the bodies of the starved and the shot, and he and all the others had gone out of their way conceal all this from the only people who might be able to help them. He packed his violin with trembling hands, and exited by a back door so he could intercept the party on the way out. The delegation had talked to no one, not one single ordinary camp inmate. Now they were going to!